Friendly Fires - "Live Those Days Tonight (Back to '89 Rave Montage)"

The self-titled debut of Friendly Fires was the choice of yours truly in PopMatter’s 2008 Slipped discs selection. Since then, the band has released an electro single (“Kiss of Life”), a split with the likeminded Holy Ghost! (not to be confused with the incredible ‘ardkore era Holy Ghost Inc.), submitted a Bugged Out mix, collaborated with Azari & III, and remixed Phoenix. All of these signs point to a more electronified Friendly Fires, but their lead single to their forthcoming Pala sounds like much of the same rock-band-as-stadium-ravers thing that defined their debut, though they’re perhaps more credible heirs to the “nu-rave” tag bequeathed upon the Klaxons (but who’d want that attacheed to them?). Nevertheless, the band has made this entertaining montage of acid’s second summer of love to go along with that single and somehow it begins to make sense.

Timothy Gabriele is a writer who studied English and Film at the University of Massachussetts at Amherst. He currently lives in the New Haven, CT region with his family. His column, The Difference Engine, appears regularly at PopMatters. He can be found blogging at 555 Enterprises.